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Topic: Trader joe's Question (Read 10141 times)

Does anyone know the ingredients of the trader joe's pizza dough ? i talking about how much flour, etc.......... to use in order to create a trader joe's pizza dough at home instead of buying it pre made, i want to make it myself. any help would be appreciated.

Federal and state laws don't require that companies reveal that level of detail--only the ingredients in order of predominance, by weight. I suspect that the flour (100% by baker's percent) is a malted all-purpose flour with the usual B vitamins, and that the water is at around 58-60% (by weight of flour). The oils are next on the list, along with the shortening a bit further down the list. Those ingredients, along with all-purpose flour, suggest that the dough will be reasonably extensible (stretchy) and will yield a soft crumb, as well as provide a modest amount of flavor. Yeast is most likely at the bottom of the list because the dough has to be made at a commissary or bakery somewhere, delivered to the stores, and kept in the refrigerated compartments until sold and makes it home to the buyer's refrigerator and lasts there for a day or so before going south. To make it through this period intact and without overfermenting, you can't use much yeast.

The challenge for you as a "reverse engineer" is to experiment with different percents. You might start with about 2% olive/canola oil, 1.75% salt, 1% shortening (such as Crisco), and 0.5% IDY (all by weight of flour). If you know the weight of the Trader Joe's dough ball, it should be fairly straightforward to come up with a rough approximation based on the baker's percents I mentioned. There's nothing unusual about the TJ dough. TJ just designed it to fit their needs.

Federal and state laws don't require that companies reveal that level of detail--only the ingredients in order of predominance, by weight. I suspect that the flour (100% by baker's percent) is a malted all-purpose flour with the usual B vitamins, and that the water is at around 58-60% (by weight of flour). The oils are next on the list, along with the shortening a bit further down the list. Those ingredients, along with all-purpose flour, suggest that the dough will be reasonably extensible (stretchy) and will yield a soft crumb, as well as provide a modest amount of flavor. Yeast is most likely at the bottom of the list because the dough has to be made at a commissary or bakery somewhere, delivered to the stores, and kept in the refrigerated compartments until sold and makes it home to the buyer's refrigerator and lasts there for a day or so before going south. To make it through this period intact and without overfermenting, you can't use much yeast.

The challenge for you as a "reverse engineer" is to experiment with different percents. You might start with about 2% olive/canola oil, 1.75% salt, 1% shortening (such as Crisco), and 0.5% IDY (all by weight of flour). If you know the weight of the Trader Joe's dough ball, it should be fairly straightforward to come up with a rough approximation based on the baker's percents I mentioned. There's nothing unusual about the TJ dough. TJ just designed it to fit their needs.

Peter

The total weight of the dough is 16 oz, im bad at reverse engineering, so it might be a while until i post some calculations, unless some of you math wize's want to help me out.

Do the instructions for the TJ pizza dough indicate a recommended size (diameter) of dough round, like 13-14 inches? With that additional piece of information I should be able to come up with a formulation for you to try.

Do the instructions for the TJ pizza dough indicate a recommended size (diameter) of dough round, like 13-14 inches? With that additional piece of information I should be able to come up with a formulation for you to try.

Assuming a 1-pound (16 oz.) Trader Joe's dough ball and a 14-inch pizza size, the thickness factor (TF) calculates out to 0.104. That places the dough thickness at roughly the thickness of a dough that is sometimes used to make a typical NY style pizza. However, because of the high amount of total fat (olive oil, canola oil and shortening), and also because the TJ dough apparently uses an all-purpose flour instead of a higher protein flour, the texture and characteristics of the finished crust will more closely mimic an American style pizza. Using the estimates I presented for baker's percents in my earlier post, here is a formulation that you might try. Remember, these are my estimates only, based on what I think TJ may be trying to do with its dough. I could make changes to baker's percents all over the place and not hit the exact combination, yet have all the ingredients in the right places in the pecking order. Mathematically, there are just too many possibilities.

I don't know how TJ's supplier makes the dough, but I would dissolve the salt in the water (on the cool side, not warm) in the mixer bowl, and I would combine the shortening (Crisco) and IDY with the flour. The Crisco can be worked into the flour with the fingers, to disperse it a bit. I would then gradually add the flour mixture to the water in the bowl and gradually mix them at low speed (stir or 1 speed). Once the dough forms a rough mass, I would then add the oil blend and knead that in at about 1 speed. Once the oil blend is incorporated, I would knead at about 1 or 2 speed for about another 4 or 5 minutes, or until the dough ball is smooth, elastic, and a bit on the tacky side. If necessary, add more flour or water, a little bit at a time, to achieve the desired consistency. Coat the finished dough ball with a bit of oil and place it in a container, for use either the same day, or, if the dough is refrigerated, for use the next day.

I was going with the ingredients that Snowdy posted early in the year. Maybe TJ's has different formulations for different store locations. Or maybe TJ's has changed the formulation. If that's the case, then all I will need is the current ingredient list to change what I gave to CaliforniaPizzaGuy. Actually, soybean oil seems more logical in a commercial product than olive oil and canola oil, mainly because it is likely to be cheaper. The Snowdy ingredient list even showed more olive oil than canola oil, which struck me as unusual since it's usually the other way around. There are no TJ's near me so I will have to rely on someone else to give me the current ingredient list.

Based on recent input from fellow member giotto on a related TJ thread, I tweaked the formulation I recently gave you by running some new numbers through my spreadsheet. The changes aren't major since it appears from giotto's information that I came quite close on the baker's percents for several of the ingredients. The major change is in the type of flour. I have substituted bread flour for all-purpose flour. Since I do not have any bread flour on hand, I could not convert its weight to volume measurements, so you will have to use weights for now. I don't think the amounts will differ all that much. I left the water at 58%, which should work for bread flour also.

I also increased the salt and olive oil/canola blend a bit, and I lowered the shortening and yeast a bit. For shortening, I substituted a non-hydrogenated version. My preference would be the Spectrum palm oil based shortening but, if you can't locate that brand, you should be able to use the Smart Balance product, which is also palm oil based but includes other ingredients. You can also use the Crisco if that is all you have, although it is a partially hydrogenated shortening. The weights of the three shortenings are so close to each other that you won't be able to differentiate between them in your measurements using ordinary measuring spoons.

It sure is good having one other guy working to reproduce it. Here's my suggestions:

1) The weight needs to be brought between 16.5 - 17 oz. But the amount of flour is good around 9.5 oz.

2) The water hydration needs to be increased...

This puppy has a decent pull and a nice saturation feel to it with a bit of a cream color (and a little sticky as mentioned by Snowdy, even when they first get it in; although flour is thrown on it before placing it in the bag). With both King Arthur and Gold Medal's better than bread flours, I find that 63% after initial kneading is complete gets me closer to the saturation feel.

3) Kosher salt equals 1 tsp.

4) The total oil needs to be reduced to no more than 8g of fat (1 g per serving) and could be as low as 5g fat due to rounding up...

Since oils are generally at 14g fat per TBL, the total of Olive and Canola need to be reduced to around 1 tsp. While Olive oil is listed before Canola oil, they can be equal in amount leaving their order arbitrary. SALT, however, is listed before the Palm oil. And we know for an absolute fact that 1 tsp of kosher salt is used; so therefore by weight Palm oil needs to be equal or less to SALT in weight as you show it; I suspect that just under 1/2 tsp Palm oil is used as you show it.

Your recommendation for Smart Balance as an alternative is one that I've exercised instead of what they use (Spectrum). Although with the flax seed that Smart Balance is now putting into it, it's starting to deviate all the more.

This puppy will not rip either. It is extensible (you're lucky to get in 1 toss if you let it sit long, unless you re-tighten the dough ball after removing it from the refrigerator to give it elasticity). I get the no-rip by kneading the bread flour during the fermentation period (about 3x before use), thereby reducing the possibility of over-kneading to get some airyness, while building-up the structure required during rest periods.

Il Fornaio uses Pendleton Power (13.5%) in-house, which is not what they use for Trader Joe's. Pendelton Power includes enzymes instead of malted barley and ascorbic acid for strength, and is very white and a bit bready. I believe the same is true for their lower protein Fischer flour (although the enzymes might be a left-over from the Fischer flours and not strictly for other Pendleton flours). I'll have to check the next time I'm at Cash & Carry in San Jose, CA. I've yet to find a similar 24g carb to 4g protein flour.

I'm trying to remember if they use compressed yeast. But I believe they use instant in-house. My guess for this application is with no growth during refrigeration, and yet decent spring, they use just under 1/4 tsp instant.

I was using the ingredient list provided by Snowdy and the total weight (1 lb.) mentioned by CaliforniaPizzaGuy. So, I juggled all the numbers to stay within the 1 lb. limit. I know that a ball of dough might not weigh exactly 1 lb., and if that is the case I might have a bit more room to play around with the numbers. I found that if I went above 58% hydration, the amount of flour went below the 10 ounces you originally mentioned. With another ounce or two of dough to play with I might be able to get the hydration higher with the right amount of flour and also keep everything else in the pecking order where they belong. I assume when you recommend 63% you are referring to water only, not the combination of water and fat as you sometimes prefer to use. Is that correct?

The 60/40 olive oil/canola oil split was somewhat arbitrary and used simply to give predominance to the olive oil over the canola oil in the pecking order. I believe it could just as well been 50/50 under labeling laws. I took your comments on fat to mean that the "total fat", that is, the oils and the shortening, should not exceed 8 grams. If so, that can be easily corrected. My observation from checking lots of labels on bottles of oils is that most oils weigh about the same per serving (usually 1 tablespoon weighs 14 grams or 14-15 ml by volume). Interestingly, 1 tablespoon of Crisco weighs 12 grams, 1 tablespoon of Spectrum weighs 13 grams, and 1 tablespoon of Smart Balance weighs 14 grams. This is of little significance in a practical sense since it is highly unlikely that you would be able to measure out exactly one tablespoon of any of these shortenings using ordinary measuring spoons.

I used ordinary salt in the dough formulation. For Kosher salt, the quantity will increase a bit from what I used. This can also be easily corrected. My spreadsheet has a Kosher salt option built into it.

To summarize, 1) the total dough weight should be around 16.5 to 17 ounces, 2) the flour is essentially bread flour, at about 9.5 ounces, 3) the recommended hydration is 63%, 4) the total fat, including the olive and canola oils and the shortening, should not exceed 8 grams, with about 1 teaspoon for the olive and canola oils and the rest for the shortening, 5) Kosher salt is used and comes to 1 teaspoon, and 6) the yeast used may be IDY, at around 1/4 teaspoon.

Did I get it right? If so, I should be able to come up with another iteration of the TJ dough formulation. BTW, where did you get all of the information on the TJ dough?

Good stuff, as always! The fats were meant to reference the g in oils. Smart Balance is my standard for dinner table sort of stuff; but the tube does not show the fats (I threw the double box away). What you got sounds great.

I can safely say that 16.5 - 17 oz is far more in the ball park for you, and that 16 oz or 17.5 oz is more of a deviation based on much weighing.

Instant is the way to go for this application... More carbon dioxide per yeast cell than active, which can help attain spring at low %.

If it's too sticky at 63%, feel free to lower down a bit... If you push down with a finger, it will feel sticky... But if you pull quickly away, it will not stick.

The protein appears between 12 - 13%... Which bread flour are U going to use?

Thanks for the confirmation. I started working on the TJ dough formulation as an accommodation to CaliforniaPizzaGuy. If I were to make the dough for myself, I would use KA bread flour (12.7%) because it is available to me in the stores and it is my favorite flour. However, I don't see why some other good bread flour can't be used. You could even use a high-gluten flour, such as the KASL. Except for the fats, the formulation would be like a slightly thicker Lehmann dough with a softer crumb, but with a bit more crunch and color.

In the revised formulation that follows, I chose to use 16.5 ounces as the total dough ball weight. For a 14-inch pizza size, that yields a thickness factor of 0.107, which is between the thickness factor of a thin NY style (for which I typically use 0.10-0.105) and the thickness factor of a medium pizza (which is around 0.11).

To simplify measuring out the olive oil and canola oil, I assigned a 50/50 ratio to the olive oil/canola oil blend. For the shortening, I assumed that it would be the Spectrum palm oil, which I believe is 100% palm oil. The Smart Balance product (I have the one without the flax seed oil) has 9 grams of total fat per serving (1 serving = 1 tablespoon = 14 grams), with 2.5 grams sat., 2.5 grams poly., and 3.5 grams mono. Crisco has 12 grams of total fat per serving, with 3 grams sat., 3 grams poly., and 4 grams mono. So, if either of these is used, I would just increase the amount a bit from that specified for shortening in the formulation below. Trying to fine tune it further is possible, but you wouldn't be able to capture the accuracy using standard measuring spoons. The total fat in the formulation should come within the 5-8 gram range. I think you will see that everything pretty much falls within the values you specified. You will also note that I lowered the yeast (IDY) to get it down to 1/4 teaspoon.

There's nothing like a patented French spiral mixer to pick up over 70 lbs or so of mixed San Francisco Biga, all natural bread flour, water and a few other ingredients and then drop them into a beautiful thoroughly mixed sponge. The spiral tool propels the necessary gas and temperature is automatically maintained at all times. I now understand why Trader Joe's dough can be so light at times... This is no flip flopping of dough.

I decided to treat Trader Joe's dough as a preferment to leverage their costly mix and combine it with a subset of ingredients that would produce a slightly chewier experience and a bit less dough per pizza. Mission accomplished.

The resulting crust weighed about 14.7 oz for a 14" pizza. It was filled with tiny air holes, with a nice pull to it, good taste and a thin crispy bottom. Total cost of of the whole pizza, less than 5 bucks with quality toppings.

(https://home.comcast.net/~keck-foundation1/traderjoe-mix.JPG)

The objective was to come between 29 oz - 30 oz for two 14" pizzas, with more of a chewy result. I added ingredients per Pete-zza's re-calcs above, with minimal customized changes*.

I put the water in first, and let it sit for a few minutes. Then I added the flour and other dry ingredients (I knew the yeast was good).

Brought it quickly together with a flat beater hook (sticks, but easy to remove and squeezes together by hand). Let it sit for 15 or so minutes to break down the tangled gluten strands. Then ran it with crappy Kitchen Aid dough hook for 10 minutes (First 3 minutes at level 1 speed. Let rest for about 2 minutes to pull dough off hook and keep heat down. Then 5 more minutes same level. Followed by short rest. Finish at level 2 speed for 2 minutes). It was smooth, no lumps.

Hand kneaded into a smooth ball. Let sit out for 15 minutes in a well oiled metal container. Put 1/2 in plastic bag, and left other 1/2 in container. Refrigerated overnight. Didn't take dough temp (probably around 75F). Next day, used 14.7 oz dough in bag. Left it out for 30 minutes before forming.

Toppings: 1/4 cup Trader Joe's No Salt Vine Ripened skinless tomatoes (immersion blended, thinned out with a little olive oil and water, with a touch of sea salt), a few Grande Fresh Mozz balls (Whole Foods, Cupertino, CA) on top of a few dry slices of cheese, and natural cased pepperoni from Swiss American Sausage Company.

Having worked recently with fellow member giotto to "reverse engineer" Trader Joe's pizza dough, I decided that maybe I should actually try to make a dough based on the formulation we ended up with. To refresh our memories, that formulation was as follows:

In making the dough, I made two changes. First, since I didn't have any bread flour on hand, I used a blend of the King Arthur all-purpose flour (11.7% protein) and the King Arthur Sir Lancelot flour (14.2% protein). I estimated that a 50/50 blend would yield a flour with a gluten content of around 12.9%. If my estimation was correct, that is a bit less than King Arthur's bread flour, which registers at 12.7% protein. Rather than to try to fine-tune the blend to get it down to 12.7%, I simply used the 50/50 ratio (i.e., 4.92 ounces of the King Arthur all-purpose flour and 4.92 ounces of the King Arthur Sir Lancelot flour). Second, since I did not have any Spectrum spread on hand, which I would have preferred to use, I used some Smart Balance blend. Since the Smart Balance blend contains some water in it, I increased its quantity slightly, from 1/2 teaspoon, as noted above, to about 3/4 teaspoon. I might mention that if one has neither the Spectrum or Smart Balance spreads, then ordinary Crisco shortening can be substituted.

To make the dough, I started by dissolving the salt (Kosher salt) in the water in the bowl of my KitchenAid stand mixer. I then combined the flour with the IDY and the Smart Balance--which I worked into the flour with my fingers (it could also have been dissolved in a bit of warm water and combined with the rest of the water)--and added the flour mixture gradually to the water in the mixer bowl and mixed at the stir speed. Once a rough dough mass was formed, I added the canola oli/olive oil blend to the bowl and kneaded that in, at speed 1. Once the oil blend was combined, I kneaded the dough at speed 1 for about 4 or 5 minutes more. From time to time, I stopped the mixer to check on the dough and to knead it a bit by hand to speed up the kneading process. Once the dough took on a smooth and elastic consistency, I removed it from the mixer bowl, kneaded it for about another 30 seconds to shape it, coated it with a bit of oil, and placed it into a covered metal container which then went into the refrigerator. It stayed there for about 46 hours, upon which time I removed the dough from the refrigerator and set it on my counter to warm up in preparation for shaping and stretching. During the time that the dough was in the refrigerator and on the counter (for about 3 hours), I estimate that it rose by about 15-20%. This was as I had expected since I used cool water in making the dough.

The dough handled very well, and I had no problem shaping and stretching the dough into a 14-inch skin. The skin was dressed in a simple pepperoni style and baked on a pizza stone that had been preheated on the lowest oven rack position for about an hour at around 500-550 degrees F. It took about 6 to 7 minutes for the pizza to bake.

The finished pizza turned out quite well. The crust had good oven spring, and it was chewy and reasonably tender. The crust was a bit thicker than I normally prefer but that is something that can be easily remedied next time by simply stretching the dough out about another inch. It is also possible to substitute the King Arthur Sir Lancelot flour for the blend I used, but if the KASL in not available, then my recommendation would be to use the King Arthur bread flour, which I think may do a little bit better job than my blend did. I also see no reason why the pizza cannot be baked on a pizza screen, using the pre-bake technique that giotto frequently uses, if so desired. A combination of screen and stone should also work out well.

One of these days, when I am near a Trader Joe's, I would like to try their pizza dough to see how it compares with the reverse-engineered version. Whatever the results, I know that the formulation that giotto and I came up with works and is very easy to implement.

While I was on vacation in Massachusetts over the holidays, I had a chance to try out a basic pizza dough as sold by a local Trader Joe’s. Since Trader Joe’s obviously uses different sources for its pizza doughs for its different store locations around the country, I took note of the ingredients in the dough I purchased. They were unbleached flour, water, yeast, soybean oil, vegetable mono and diglycerides, dextrose, salt, ascorbic acid, and L-cysteine. The label for the bag of dough gave the weight of the dough as one pound, although when I weighed the dough on a scale, it came to 18.6 ounces. The label instructions indicated that the dough was for a 12-inch pizza. Since I wanted to make a thin NY style pizza, I elected to use the dough to make a roughly 15-inch pizza. The pizza was dressed with a simple pizza sauce, a 50/50 blend of Grande whole-milk and part-skim mozzarella cheeses, pre-cooked Italian sausage, pepperoni slices, raw and sautéed mushrooms, and raw and cooked green peppers and onions.

The pizza was baked on a pizza screen on the top oven rack position for about 6 minutes and then shifted onto a pizza stone that had been preheated for about an hour at 500 degrees F, the maximum temperature that the oven (a gas oven) could deliver. It took the oven considerably longer than my oven at home to finish baking the pizza, perhaps an extra 8 minutes or so.

The photo below shows the finished pizza. I would describe the results as acceptable but nowhere near as good as the Trader Joe’s “California clone” version I made and reported on earlier in this thread. The Massachusetts Trader Joe’s crust was a bit on the pasty side and considerably breadlike and with little flavor and only modest coloration. The crumb was also on the dense side. On the plus side, the dough cost only $0.79. And, obviously, it was ready to go after a brief counter warmup time.